The campaign seeks to identify and recover relics of a national network of cycle tracks from the ?30s They?re hidden in plain sight, remnants of a lost time when cycling was not just mainstream, but a dominant means of transportation. Hundreds of miles of concrete tracks, flecked with pinkish concrete, spider out across the U.K., a ghost system of cycling infrastructure that present an alternative history of transportation, and hints at what could have been.
Even more curious, they weren?t built in the last few decades; they date from the ?30s.
Carlton Reid, an author and historian from Newcastle, first uncovered this hidden part of Britain?s cycling infrastructure during research for his book on cycling history, Bike Boom. This immense system of roadways?Reid?s research suggests there might be as many as 500 miles spread across the U.K.?speaks to a time when cycling was much more popular. They?re a welcome relief from the ?crap cycle lane? common in the country today, he says. A combination of archival research, searching through old maps, and even Google Street View, helped him dig up this part of bicycling history. Some are literally buried, some have degraded over time, and many are still in use, but few are aware of the extent of this network.
Reid launched a popular Kickstarter campaign?which is about to hit $20,000 and already blew past its stretch goals?to fund research to uncover more of these hidden cycle paths, and pass that information along to an urba...